I have used QED-UK to purchase a new 28" widescreen Hitachi television, and payed £380 including free delivery, at least £50 cheaper than most high street stores charge for the same model. Having browsed the site for other items, the prices are clearly competitive, and QED often rank high on price comparison sites such as pricerunner.com and kelkoo.com.

So, I decided to go ahead with my order on the Thursday before Good Friday. I had a few queries to make before purchasing the product, so I decided to order by telephone.

The phone was answered almost immediately, and the salesperson dealt with my query (namely, whether the television cabinet was optional or not) politely and efficiently. I was promised delivery on the following Wednesday.

After several long days of waiting, the television finally arrived by courier, as promised on the Wednesday (noon to be exact).

Clearly, this is just one problem-free experience, and the only true test of an online retailer is how the cope with problems, but hopefully I won't test QED in that respect (I'm quite happy with my television thank-you).

The service itself was excellent, but the website is quite tricky to get around, and could be improved somewhat, so QED fail to get full marks because of this. The product information could also be improved, but is better than many other e-tailers.

The main drawback of buying goods from QED is the same drawback as using any other retailer, that is you have to pretty much know exactly what you want before you order, so I'd always recommend a trip to John Lewis or Currys before exercising your flexible friend.